


Bitter Pill

by InAmongstTheMountains



Category: Fallen Hero Series - Malin Rydén
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-14
Updated: 2019-03-14
Packaged: 2019-11-17 20:29:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,436
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18105902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InAmongstTheMountains/pseuds/InAmongstTheMountains
Summary: After the Auction. Spoilers. Abel & Napoleon are mine.You swore you were never going to get this deep, swore you'd never let anyone get this close. Swore you weren't going to fall in love. But you did, and now you have to pay the price.





	Bitter Pill

This was never going to be easy. But you had to make it harder.

And you’re going to pay that higher price.

You invited Dr. Mortum out, not to Joes, but another private (and admittedly quieter) hole-in-the-wall. Besides, there were too many memories at Joes. Too many fond and painful memories.

Maybe it was as security, taking him out to a semi-public space. Maybe it was respect, giving you both the chance to step away without the added bitterness of watching the other leave a trusted place. Maybe… maybe it was to make the distinction, the separation, the truth, unmuddled and new.

You should have never fallen in love with him.

Abel had always been your refuge, but right now you wished more than anything he were also a telepath. Stuck in the quiet claustrophobic space of your own brain, the only voice is your guilt screaming and screaming at you.

Fiddling with the napkin, you brush off the waitress that asks for the 3rd time if you wanted a refill on your drink. You just shake your head, watching the ice slowly melt and wish you could do the same. She hesitates, stuck somewhere between the ingrained training of her job and the human instinct to ask of you’re alright. With no response, she steps away. You’re glad, well, thankful at least. You couldn’t take that kind of empathy right now, even head-blind.

The good doctor arrives precisely on time. His sharp eyes narrowing affectionately as he catches sight of you in a shadowed booth. You can’t help the way your heart flutters and the ghost of a smile that breaks your facade at the sight of him. He chose to dress up slightly today, a bright turtleneck instead of a tee shirt, though he’d be wont to leave off his lab coat. You both have joked about that, never shedding the skin of scientist, and the memory forms a lump you can’t swallow. The knot in your throat only tightens when he sits, taking your hand in his to kiss your knuckles.

“Mon cherie.” His eyes twinkle in greeting, slowly sobering at the deadened expression you wear. “Not your usual tastes.” He spares a second to study the restaurants pallid interior then shifts back to you, unmasked concern growing in his dark eyes.

You suddenly can’t look at them.

“What’s wrong Abel?” His words are a murmur, full of an emotion you never dared give name; your name, your lie, a cold cruel knife to the gut. “Is it your employer?”

How right he is, as always. Your fingers feel heavy as lead, heavy as your heart, still wrapped in his, wrapped up in him.

You were never supposed to fall in love, and especially not with someone at the end of the day you barely know. Not about the important things anyway, not his real name, or his past, or where he studied. Just the soft stuff, like the specific temperature he takes his coffee at, the way his brow knits when he encounters a particularly frustrating problem, where to touch him to elicit a laugh, and how his expression, at once both masked and heart-baringly open, shifts when emotion and clinical logic fight for focus on his face.

Just like he’s looking at you now.

You manage a nod, swallowing down the stone in your throat. “It is.” The weight settles back uncomfortably in your stomach.

He waits for you to continue, always the concerned partner, and you will your voice a semblance of steadiness. “I… I want… no I need, to tell you the truth. About them, about me.”

Concern and curiosity in equal measure knit his brow. “I’m listening mon cherie.”

“Remember, months ago, back at the gala? In the hospital I told you I’d been in a coma? I was in it for a long long time.” You’ve been dropping hints a long while, maybe a part of you wanted him to figure it out before it came to this.

He nods shortly, dark eyes never leaving your face.

“And even before, when I told you I called the Special Directive on Psychopathor and that I wanted the best?”

Another sharp nod.

“Its connected see. My boss. Napoleon. I….. We, we’re the same person.” There, you said it. If truth was supposed to set you free, then why did you feel like you’d be sick? You tried for a smile; it failed miserably. Instead your heart pounds in your ears and you imagine every ounce of despair shows etched on the face that’s become more real than your own.

He’s silent for a long time. Then finally, quietly, “You’re not a telepath mon cherie.” His fingers twitch around yours.

You swallow. Hard. “No, I’m not.”

You can see all the pieces finally coming together for him, and it’s almost worse that you lacked the courage to say it out loud. To admit this body had always been a shell, a pretty puppet, no matter how real you’ve felt in it..

Mortum sets your hand down on the table.

The lack of contact never hurt so much.

He laces his own fingers together resting them against his nose, obscuring half his expression. What is left on display is a conflict behind his eyes that scares you. There is an icy edge to the anger there, the betrayal, and you’re instantly reminded the man before you had once been a true villain.

It hurts and it’s both raw and new and distant and familiar. That level of disapproval, of distrust and disrespect, it reminds you of the Farm, and it breaks what’s left of your heart.

“I’m glad that’s finally out in the open, Napoleon.” The name is laced with venom coming from him, the same viciousness you saw the night of the gala as he carried Abel’s empty form to safety. “Who knows how long I’d have let you continue to use me.”

“Mortum, I-”

“No.” He doesn’t have to hold up a finger to shut you down. The withering glare did that by itself. “We’re done, I’m not hearing any more lies.”

“Just let me explain.” You cry, reaching for him before he’s the chance to move beyond the table as he stands. You catch his sleeve in trembling fingers, the speed of reflexes from years in aikido. “Please.”

Maybe it was the sound of your -Abel’s- voice, maybe it was an acknowledgement of all the months you’d shared together, but he stopped. No words came with the frigid look. Out of respect for what you’d had, he was sparing a final moment.

Better make it good.

“I’ve always been honest with you.” Not that that has much credibility now. “And Abel- I-” You shiver, there’s another secret that you’ve never shared, not even to Ortega, but you know he’ll understand. “I’ve always been more me in this body,” Your whisper shakes along with your shoulders, the only thing holding back inevitable tears the impossible sound of your admittance. You became Cain, you christened yourself as you should have been, but there was always more than just your tattoos that made you feel wrong. “How I’m supposed to be. How I’m not in Napoleon’s. This body is right.” You stress the last word, hoping, praying.

You can’t breathe.

Something imperceptible shifts in his face. The anger is still there, the hurt, but there’s also an understanding, one deep and visceral, and impossibly close to home for him as well. A fragment of tension leaves his shoulders as he extracts the cuff of his coat from your grasp. You feel the cloying still weight of the confrontation drop into unease and anxiety. The good doctor draws several steadying breaths. But when he opens his eyes, it’s not acceptance you see, instead the anger has tempered into dark mistrust, edged with something reminiscent of sympathy.

“Just because I understand does not negate the truth.” His voice is far more even than yours, low and brittle. “I can’t see you now.” He doesn’t specify if its in this moment or for the rest of your shared time in Los Diablos. “Good night…” There a lingering, a goodbye unfinished in the wake of not knowing how to address you. He doesn’t wait for you to reply. Not that you deserve him to.

You’re alone at the table. Just as you always have been. Just as you deserve for daring, for breaking his heart.

The ice in your glass is long turned to water when the waitress returns. She says nothing, you share nothing. You’re just left with a devastating emptiness,

and the bill.


End file.
